


salt

by star_sky_earth



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mythology, Bellamy Blake Is A Sad Ho, Bisexual Bellamy Blake, F/M, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Inspired by Madeline Miller, Lesbian Octavia Blake
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2020-08-26
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:27:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25932097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/star_sky_earth/pseuds/star_sky_earth
Summary: There was a moment, then, when I might still have turned back. A split-second of opportunity, no longer than the space between one breath and the next, where everything I was and might yet be hung in the balance - my destiny a lot yet to be drawn, a tossed coin yet to land. I could have pushed her away. Could have covered my eyes and fallen to my knees on the cold stone floor, begging for forgiveness, rending my clothing in the manner of remorseful men. But I let that moment pass. And when she kissed me, her soft mouth pressing against my own, I knew that my fate was set. The twin threads of our destiny tied together in an intricate knot that no man or wrathful god might untangle, where the Fates wove one thread now forced to also weave the other, bound to her forever.All my life I had been looking for my fate, and here, at last, I had found it with her.Bellarke Greek mythology AU by way of Madeline Miller.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin
Comments: 26
Kudos: 71





	salt

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not entirely sure what this is, aside from exactly what my brain demanded I write.
> 
> Bellarke Greek mythology AU by way of Madeline Miller's Circe, also taking inspiration from Game of Thrones, The Little Mermaid, and Mists of Avalon. Bonus points for those who catch the Narnia and His Dark Instruments references.
> 
> I have made a playlist for this fic, which you can listen to [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7njQ10DljB0LIv9o4QJjmF?si=13A5By2sTSSHYD5EiKwFiA)!

  
  


I met her for the first time in her father’s home.

An simple sentence, almost stupefying in its blandness, lending itself to any one of a thousand different stories. Perhaps you imagine that her father was a farmer, the packed earth floors of his home strewn with rushes, his sturdy wooden table laden with rough bread and sharp goat’s cheese, our cups filled with fresh spring water so cold and sharp it hurt to drink. Or maybe you think that she was a princess, and her father a king, flaunting his misbegotten wealth before a host of desperate travellers, setting before us great cuts of bleeding meat and gold dishes of herb-crusted fish, the finest wine from his vast stores.

I wish. That would have been a happier tale, or at least an easier one. I wish I did not have to tell you that her father was Poseidon, that great and terrifying god of storm and sea, ruler of the uneasy earth that pitches and rolls beneath your feet, reducing whole cities to rubble with one lazy shrug of his broad shoulders. His home, a palace at the very end of all things, where dark sea meets darker sky, carved out of that great cliff that surrounds the world, a network of winding tunnels and caverns so vast that you could stare up into the darkness and almost imagine that you were looking up into the night sky. It was a cold place, and a cheerless one. I shivered, to sit in his great hall and hear the constant crash of waves against stone, knowing that it was only his power that kept the whole structure from collapsing, held back the sea from rushing in and drowning us all. One moment, one lapse of concentration, and we would all have been crushed to powder.

What a man I must have been, to dine in mighty Poseidon’s halls! But I was not there in my own right, only accompanying my sister, the great hero Octavia, a warrior blessed by Athena herself. Raven-haired and fearless, a thousand men had already sacrificed their lives to her sword, and even more maidens sacrificed their honour to her desire. Already our ship’s hold swelled with riches beyond imagination, more than any reasonable god’s portion of gold and precious treasures, and still we were only at the very beginning of our voyage, the opening lines of the songs that would be sung of her deeds for centuries, the great future that Athena had promised to her favourite daughter. 

It had been a shock, when Octavia turned seventeen and our modest wooden hut was suddenly filled with lightning and the smell of petrichor, the great goddess appearing before our hearth. I had never known who my sister’s father was, knowing only that my own father had died some years before her birth, leaving behind no inheritance but a plot of rocky earth and a small herd of goats. My mother kept her secrets well, and I’d had little time to dwell on the question, caring only that my sister was kept well and well loved, needing no truth other than the feel of her small hand in mine, the shared blood that ran through both our veins. Even if I had cared to think on it, I could never have guessed that my baby sister had no father at all, born from one night of passion between Athena and my mother Aurora. But, I suppose, if children can be born from showers of gold, from almond trees and sea water and clouds, then a babe born from two women is an ordinary kind of miracle.

I might have been angry, that the gods had left us all those long year to scrape and beg, to eke what meagre living we could from the unforgiving earth, to watch my mother’s hands slowly twist into claws, worn and aching in the cold weather. But my sister and mother were overjoyed by Athena’s late appearance, her belated gifts and empty words of honour, and what right did I have to ruin their joy? 

My mother wept with pride when Octavia accepted Athena’s patronage, her only daughter preparing to leave that very night. My eyes also burned, my throat tightening, but I held myself steady, knowing that it would be left to me now to carry on our family line, to make the best life I could from the scraps of what destiny had discarded. It was only at the very last moment, when all the goodbyes had already been made, Octavia kneeling down to ruffle the fur of her favourite hound, that Athena finally turned to me with the unwelcome news of my own task. She cast it as an afterthought, a last minute gift, but of course she had known what she wanted from me from the very beginning, her feigned forgetfulness intended only to remind me of my place. 

“And you are to follow, to write of your sister’s great deeds, to set them down in song and script so that they might echo through all the long ages of man.” 

And so my life had been stolen from me, pledged in service to a goddess who did not even care to know my name. Not for my own sake - no glorious prophecy written for me in the stars, the all-seeing eyes of the three Fates passing over me with as little interest as they passed over my goats - but for the sake of another, my only destiny to ensure that of my sister. 

For many years I carried my resentment with me, held it close and dear as any child, let its sink its claws into my chest, turning all my victories to dust, my hopes to ash, all my fleeting joys to bitter gall in my mouth. It is only now, looking back, that I can see that it was this very invisibility, my utter lack of significance, that allowed me to know her at all. And for that reason alone, if nothing else, I cannot in the end bring myself to regret it. 

\- -

The exact reason why we happened to be in Poseidon’s halls, I cannot recall. Some task maybe, some great feat of endurance or cleverness that Athena had set before my sister, a chance to win yet more glory for her goddess. Or perhaps it was a favour we asked from the old sea god, or the use of some ancient, fabled treasure. By that point, nearly ten years into our interminable journey, I had long since stopped keeping track of each individual move in what had turned out to be an endless chess game, knowing only my own place in it - that of an unwitting pawn. 

Poseidon himself sat at the high table at the far end of the hall, upon a great monstrous throne of basalt and granite, hacked from the earth with an indifferent hand. Alone among his fellow Olympians, he had no taste for beauty or finery, no appreciation for any of the small comforts or graceful pursuits that his brothers and sisters used to ease the unbearable boredom of their immortal lives. His halls were stark and bare of ornament, beset with cold drafts that whistled along the narrow corridors, dimly lit with pitch torches that guttered and hissed from the constant drip of cold water, the walls slippery with condensation and moss. Famously foul of temper, he made a disagreeable host, providing no entertainment beyond the cries the drowning sailors, no great wonders but the shipwrecks that littered his ocean floors. Never once did I dare to look directly at him, finding the limits of my courage in staring at his feet - cold grey skin covered in barnacles and small, creeping things, a pool of water collecting around his soles.

At his left hand sat Despoina, the ancient sea goddess, so old that her origins were lost to history; those who once might have remembered now long past words or reason. Some of the men said that she was Poseidon’s daughter, his first born and most powerful, others swore that she was his sister, or perhaps his lover, or even some combination of the three. Still others whispered, faces pale with the fear of bringing down divine wrath, that the aged hag was even older than Poseidon himself, the last remnant of some primordial bloodline even more ancient and bloodthirsty than the Titans, allowing Poseidon dominion over the waters only as long as it pleased her. Hers were the mysteries of the deep, those dark depths of the ocean where no light ever shone, where the only life that existed crawled and dragged itself along the floor in wretched, piteous deformity. No one, mortal or god, had ever seen her face, her head kept covered with a thick grey veil embroidered with pearls and fragments of broken shell. Heavily adorned as it was, it should have rattled whenever she moved - but when she turned her head there was only silence. 

I sat next to my sister at that first meal, in a place of reflected honour. Octavia did not look at Poseidon either, but it was disinterest rather than fear that stayed her gaze, far more concerned with the contents of her cup, the honey-blonde serving girl that sat in her lap, whispering in her ear and hand-feeding her the tastiest morsels. The men around my sister hung on her every word as if they came from Athena herself, fighting amongst themselves for the smallest honours, ready to draw their blades for the chance to carve her meat, to slit throats for the distinction of filling her cup. I ignored them, as was my wont. It was not for no reason that the men disliked me, thought me dour and proud, my silent disapproval somehow more aggravating to them than any insult. 

I felt it as soon as she walked in. Some change in pressure, the quality of the air, a sensation like my ears were popping, surfacing too soon from a dive into the depths. I looked around to see if anyone else had noticed, but no one gave any sign of it, too caught up in their childish games.

Turning to the entrance, I saw a group of women entering the hall. _Poseidon’s daughters_ , someone near me whispered, their voice suitably awed, and one by one the tables of men fell quiet, a hushed silence I had only heard in temples, the most sacred of sacred spaces. Naiads and nymphs, numerous as the waves and dainty as sea foam, their bubbling laughter filling the hall like salt air, lifting the fatigue from our limbs like a fresh breeze dancing over sunburnt skin. Sensing the men’s curious eyes on them, the girls giggled and whispered amongst themselves, lifting their veils to cover their hair, rushing to sit at the feet of Despoina, who for her part seemed to greet them with pleasure, lifting her wrinkled hands to cup their rosy cheeks, admiring their shyly presented silks and crafts. 

Closing my eyes, breathing in their sweet salt scent, I was at once taken back to the cliffs next to my childhood home, how it had felt to stand there as a boy and watch the horizon, longing for my life to begin, that shining moment when all seemed possible and yet impossibly out of reach. The same yearning once more filled my chest, a feeling I had thought lost to me forever, and I put out a hand on the table to steady myself, the tender pain of youth almost too much to bear on such weary shoulders. 

When I opened my eyes, there she was, staring at me. 

Later, she would tell me that she felt it too. Not quite so visceral or immediate, perhaps, my own response being so entirely mortal, but rather some deeper, more subtle perception of the wheels of destiny turning, of something larger being set in motion that could not easily be undone. 

She never told me if she greeted that feeling with fear or anticipation. 

\- -

Even from a distance, I knew that she was beautiful. No great leap of logic on my part - what else could the daughter of a god be but beautiful? Perhaps it would serve me better to say this - that, even from a distance, I knew that she was different. 

Her sisters, lovely as they were, barely seemed attached to this earth. They did not walk, they _flowed_ , gliding like silver fishes through clear water, hardly disturbing the air around them, their lilting voices drifting away just before they reached your ear, as if caught up in an invisible wind. Watching them gather around Despoina in a gilded, fluttering chorus, you could imagine taking one into your lap and not feeling the weight, kissing one and feeling her melt to nothing on your tongue. She was different. She had presence, weight, rooted to the ground in a way that her sisters were not, soundless but careful, taking the measure of each step before she moved. Out of all the women, she alone did not wear a veil, her golden curls left free to hang almost to her waist, kept back from her face by two twisted strands pinned with a seashell comb. Her cheeks were flushed, her chin held high and defiant, her blue eyes piercing as she looked at me, regarding me just as frankly as I regarded her. 

Just then a wave crashed against the cliff, followed immediately by some terrible grinding sound like a ship had run aground, dragging its belly slowly across the jagged rock. From the high table came a great booming laugh - Poseidon, unmoved by the entrance of his daughters, taking reckless joy in the plight of a hundred helpless mortals. Not a god that would look kindly to his daughter taking one to her bed. 

I looked away. 

The rest of the meal was a blur. My appetite gone, I shook so that I could barely lift my cup to my mouth, spilling nearly half of my wine across the table. My sister noticed - of course she did, sharp-eyed disciple of Athena that she was - and joked that I swayed as if we were still at sea. The men around me laughed, and even the serving girl tucked her smiling face into my sister’s neck, arching her back as Octavia palmed one high round breast. I swallowed, my own face burning red. Whatever respect I might once have been afforded as my sister’s brother was long since gone, worn done over time by her blatant disregard, my own stated lack of ambition. The men knew, as did the gods, that I was no threat to them. 

\- -

Later, I lay down to sleep on the floor of the great hall with all the other men, turning my face to the wall as they bedded down around me. Drunk on wine and the glory of feasting with gods, they did not go to their rest gracefully, fights breaking out as suddenly as they ended, short tempers fraying over the smallest of perceived insults - the choice of this sleeping space or that, which man had caught a woman’s eye during the meal, who had cheated who at dice. One man dragged a serving girl to his bed - it was too dark to see if she was truly dragged, or if she went willingly to the hard floor - but inebriated as he was, his passsion lasted only a couple of minutes before his groans echoed through the chamber, slumping into sleep seconds later. Shortly afterwards, I heard the scuffle of her departure. Eventually, however, the room quietened as the men fell asleep, leaving me to my own uneasy thoughts. 

How long I lay there, staring up into that empty darkness, I do not know. All around me slumped the great mass of humanity, men snoring and moaning brokenly in their sleep; outside, there was the endless crashing of the waves, the wind howling like the cries of a thousand doomed men. And inside my chest, my heart thundered against my ribs, my head spinning like I had just taken a great blow - and perhaps I had. 

I could not go to her. It was unthinkable. And yet, neither could I stay. 

At last I rose, creeping quietly from the hall. There was no one awake to witness my escape, no guards posted to block my path. What do gods have to fear from mortal men, clumsily made and fragile as we are? The only real danger was my sister, and I had no doubt that her chamber was attended closely, the very best of Poseidon’s men guarding her door. When heroes sleep in the homes of the gods, the line between guest and hostage is not so easily drawn. Once I might have feared for Octavia's safety, drunk and separated from her men, her own sword laid down to take up a lover in her arms, but I had learned my lesson long ago. All those years spent watching over her crib, guarding her childhood steps, always there to intercede between her curious hand and the lure of open flame - and all of it useless, when she had a goddess to protect her all along. My sister had never been mine to keep safe. 

I had no idea where I was going, feeling my way blindly in the darkness, and yet somehow my feet knew the way, a tugging in my stomach like I was being led by some invisible cord, Ariadne’s red string tied somewhere under my left ribs. Normally I prided myself on my stealth, my ability to creep unseen through the busiest enemy camp, but that night each one of my steps seemed to echo like thunder, each breath as loud as a hurricane, all too aware how easily I might be discovered. That I was not caught immediately only meant that no one cared to look for me, nothing but a loose thread hanging from the great tapestry of fate, my intentions mattering as little as the motivations of the scurrying ant.

Down I crept, feeling my way along the damp walls, down and still further down, until I could feel the weight of the world bearing down upon me, the tunnel around me narrowing, reaching the limits of even Poseidon’s power to bend the earth to his will. 

Just as I thought I must turn back, at last I came to a room - or rather a door, made of thick oak and inlaid with mother of pearl, so highly polished that it shone brightly even in the darkness. Reaching out, it opened soundlessly to my touch, swinging wide. Stepping forward, I held back a gasp.

Nothing I had seen so far in Poseidon’s palace could have prepared me for this, no indication that anything so wondrous might exist within its cold walls. A bedchamber, but with only three of its walls carved from the rock, the fourth side left entirely open to the sea, deep waters held back by some invisible magic so that it looked like the waters might rush in at any moment. Moonlight shone through the depths, illuminating the room with an eerie iridescent light, shimmering across the floor in a hundred different colours, like those glimmering lights that are my mother’s namesake. As I watched, open-mouthed, a shoal of gleaming fish swam by, chased by some great sea serpent; just beyond, I could see an immense shadow moving in the darkness, a leviathan moving soundlessly through the deep. Unthinking, I made a sign of protection, turning swiftly when I heard an amused sound behind me. 

There she was. Reclining leisurely in her bed, propped up on one lazy elbow, watching me with that same detached manner as I imagined her aunts and uncles on Mount Olympus might observe the people below, entire lives played out for the idle amusement of an immortal audience. Her blue eyes, bright and clear as any crystal, sharpened as she looked me over, taking the measure of me, like a sailor sighting a new and distant shore, any excitement tempered by knowledge of the dangers that might be lurking within. 

It is a common indulgence of lovers to claim that their beloved’s eyes change with their moods. Sailors far from home desire nothing more than to speak of those that they have left behind, and over the years I have heard a thousand thousand tales of lost love and longing, differing only in the smallest details, that great collective longing of lonely men for the places that they will never see again. I have lost count of the men that I have heard describe their lover’s eyes as an ever-changing kaleidoscope, shifting colour and shape to suit every emotion, like one of the mythical chameleons of Aithiops.

In this case, however, I pride myself that I actually speak the truth. From across the hall, I might still have taken my love for mortal - uncommonly beautiful, true, the kind of beauty that curses a woman all the way to her grave, whether a quick death at the hands of a scorned lover or the slow, living death of dedication as a temple virgin. Up close, however, there could be no doubt that she was of divine blood. Her eyes were extraordinary, a constantly shifting wonder as restless and unpredictable as the sea, one moment beckoning you in to play in clear waters, the next smashing entire fleets to splinters, dragging whole armies under to join those wretched souls lost forever under the crashing waves. When she was angry, her eyes darkened to a blue so deep it was almost black, when she was sad they faded to a fine, ice-bound grey, in the moments after we came together, relaxed in all her satisfied pleasure, they glowed a rich, lazy cerulean. In the weeks that followed I would learn all of her moods, a single glance enough to reveal all her secrets, to let me know if I should approach with confidence or humility, sweep her up in my arms or go before her on bended knee.

My favourite however, or what would become my favourite, was the colour of her eyes in the morning. When she first woke, in those unguarded moments before she was quite herself - the lightest, most delicate blue, so pale it was almost translucent, the colour of the uncertain dawn sky. Many mornings I watched her wake, blinking sleepily, her pupils dilating as they fixed on me, the colour of her eyes slowly deepening as she reached across the bed, set joyfully about rousing me from my relaxed state.

But I am getting ahead of myself. Then, at that first moment between us, I did not yet know her well enough to guess her reaction to me, had not yet learned to read the subtle language of her body, what it meant as she slowly looked me up and down, bright blue eyes narrowing, the faintest of lines furrowing her smooth brow. I knew only that I trembled, to come upon her so suddenly, my hand shaking as I closed the door so that it clanged heavily against the frame, sharp and clear as a warning bell, both of us holding our breath as we waited to see if the noise would rouse the household from its rest. 

It did not, and I turned back to find her still watching me, motionless as only a god can be, their immortal bodies being so much less unruly than our own. She shifted as I approached the bed, uncertainty passing like a shadow across her face, and I paused, giving her the chance to call out, to flee - still time to change what happened next, the course of our entwined lives not yet set. Too late I remembered the stories of mortal men coming upon divine maidens at rest, the devastation that inevitably followed, all the pages of our people’s proud history written in blood and bruises on unwilling flesh. What if she thought I was another one of those men, some graceless brute more akin to beast than man, here only to seek my own pleasure? I cringed. No need for divine punishment, the eternal torments devised for Prometheus and Sisyphus before me - I could have cursed myself for my own stupidity, could have wept for what she must have thought of me. 

I waited, miserable in my shame, and eventually she moved, but only to pull the bedcovers back.

An invitation. 

The bed was soft and welcoming as I lay down, the covers heavily embroided with fine golden thread, the pillow cradling my head like I had slept there a thousand nights. Yet I barely noticed any of it, to be so near to her, the tension in my chest drawing tight as a bow string, scarely able to breathe for fear that I might disturb a single hair on her perfect head.

This close, I could see how finely she was made, how beautiful, so that all the usual words for beauty fell away, devised by mortal men and thus worthless, fundamentally incapable of capturing her loveliness, her divine symmetry. Her hair, loose now around her shoulders, shone like burnished gold and fell in curls and waves to her shapely waist, naturally lending itself to perfection. Her teeth were white as polished ivory, her cheeks and lips fresh blushed like the new growth of spring flowers, her skin as flawless and luminescent as a pearl. Even her ear was enough to make poets weep, curled about itself like a delicate shell, so that my fingers ached to trace the lines of it.

She waited, indulgent as any parent as I looked at her, let my eyes drink their fill, just the sight of her enough to restore strength and vitality to my tired limbs, as cool water flowing across parched lips. When at last she judged me done, an amused smile playing about the corners of her mouth, she gestured for me to lie back against the pillow, to submit myself for my own inspection in turn.

I wondered if she had ever seen a mortal before. If she had, it surely had not been so close or so intimate, my body seemingly as fascinating to her as hers had been to me - although I fear that I got by far the better end of the bargain. 

I blushed as she examined me, suddenly ashamed of the body that I’d given no thought to in years. Once, in my youth, I had been beautiful. Before Athena’s fateful appearance split our family like a lightning strike, our home had been plagued with girls and young men seeking my attention, driving my poor mother to distraction with their doelike eyes and beseeching voices, their slender limbs draped across our furniture like wilting vines. Not a few I’d taken to bed, delighting in my own beauty even as I delighted in theirs, coaxing dripping pleasure from their pliant bodies like honey. One maiden, Gina, I’d even thought to wed, her quick smile and soft eyes as sweet to me as any ripe fruit. 

I allowed myself a brief moment of regret as my goddess looked me over - despair, that I should meet her now instead of then, but it was purest folly. Even then, at the very height of my youth and beauty, I could not have hoped to hold a candle to her. 

And now? What now did I have to offer my love? She, who held all the beauty of the immortal ocean in her eyes, her very flesh formed from divine breath and starlight - what could she expect in return for all her bountiful gifts?

Hair, curled and roughened from years of exposure to salt water and sea air, so long that it curled around my ears. My skin, dark and freckled as any peasant toiling beneath the harsh midday sun. Dull brown eyes - softened, at least, by long lashes, spreading like a fan against my cheek. A full but chapped mouth, its upper curve bisected by a small white scar that even now, years later, stood out stark against my tanned skin. The clumsy bulk of my body, the slim lines of my youth long since replaced with layers of hard muscle, broad arms criss-crossed with scars, a small patch of my skin above my left elbow permanently marred by a wayward splash of burning oil. My sister still had the smooth skin of a newborn, her patron deity restoring her to wholeness after every skirmish, but I had no such protection, and even a poet must take up arms in the heat of battle. 

A paltry selection of offerings indeed, nothing left of me but scraps to lay at my love’s feet.

At least, I thought ruefully, I might have bathed. Along with all the other men, I had washed myself in the sea before coming ashore, but I wished now that I could have cleansed myself properly, come to her anointed with scented oils and fragrant herbs, the best version of myself. 

She looked me over with a healer’s keen eye, missing nothing. I shivered as she reached for my hands, turning them over, carefully tracing over the blisters and callouses that marked my rough palms, the signs of a decade’s worth of toil at the oars.

“Does it hurt?”

Her voice was sweet and melodious, yet deeper than I’d imagined, and so taken was I with its unexpected sound that it took me a moment to reply, realising only too late that she’d asked me a question.

“Does what hurt, goddess?”

“Dying.” Her eyes were a light blue now, the curious shade of a sea bird’s egg, and although her tone was light there was a hunger there too, ravenous for any knowledge of the mortality that she’d never experience. Even then, on our first night together, I should have known how it would end between us. “Does it hurt?”

“I’m not dying,” I said sharply, feeling the blood drain from my face, suddenly scared that she’d seen the signs of my death written on my body, some sickness I’d not yet noticed, festering deep within my flesh. I sat up, remembering the old wisdom - never ask a question of the gods, for fear that they might answer.

Her brow furrowed, and she lay a firm hand on my chest, pushing me back down on the pillow. I went easily, as weak in her hold as a newborn lamb, feeling as though my heart might beat out of my chest at her touch - perhaps this was the death that she’d spoken of. 

“But you are mortal,” she said, tapping a finger on my breastbone. “Dying. From the day that you are born.”

“Ah.” Relieved, I allowed myself a smile at her expense, relaxing back into the pillow. She frowned, starting to pull her hand away, and I rushed to correct my mistake, laying my hand over hers as I sought to placate her. “It doesn’t hurt, no. We cannot feel it, at least not until the very end of our lives.”

“I see.” The storm that had begun to gather in her eyes calmed, her hand relaxing against my chest. At that moment she seemed so young and myself so old - it was difficult to remember that she outnumbered me in years by many decades, if not centuries. Mountains would rise and fall during her lifespan, streams turning to mighty rivers that cut through rock, the constellations themselves rewritten into new epic sagas of victory and defeat. “I have not spoken to a mortal before. I have always wondered - it seemed a miserable existence, to live in such pain.” 

Her hunger for knowledge only partly assuaged, her attention next turned to my stubble, the lengthening shadow of my beard across my skin. Reluctantly, I reliquished my grasp on her hand, only to hold my breath as she ran her dainty fingertips lightly across the rough bristle covering my jaw, wondering at the rasp against her skin. 

“And do many mortals wear their beard like _this_?” Her nose wrinkled.

I had learned my lesson well, and was careful this time to keep my amusement hidden. “No, not many. I haven’t shaved since this morning - tomorrow, you will find me clean-shaven again. If I left it long enough though, it would become a beard.”

I watched her tuck the information away to puzzle over later. Gods either _were_ or _were not_ , depending on their fancy, able to alter their appearance in an instant. Transition, growth, change - these were inherently human things, and thus unfamiliar to her.

At her gentle insistence, I sat up to remove my chiton, letting the coarse linen fall to the floor as I lay back down. She took her time exploring my naked body, running her hand over my chest hair before trailing downwards, following the line of dark hair that pointed like an arrow to my groin. She did not touch me there though - not yet. Instead she occupied herself with stroking the downy hair of my thighs, running an assessing hand over the muscles of my calves, even drawing a playful finger along the bottom of my feet to watch me jerk away. 

If she noticed how I clenched my fists in the sheets she did not mention it. But her eyes, when she looked up at me, were sparkling like the sun on rushing water.

Finally she made her way back up my body, leaning over as she took me tentatively in hand. I stiffened immediately, gratified to see how her eyes widened in surprise, humbled in the very next second as she stroked me up and down, my own eyes falling shut in pleasure. I groaned, sinking back into the pillow. Her breasts were soft against my arm through her chiton, and as her hair fell gently around me I again breathed in that sweet salt scent, my body lighting up with desire, my blood singing with the pure unbounded possibility of all things.

The bed shifted as she leaned in closer, and I knew that she was going to kiss me.

There was a moment, then, when I might still have turned back. A split-second of opportunity, no longer than the space between one breath and the next, where everything I was and might yet be hung in the balance - my destiny a lot yet to be drawn, a tossed coin yet to land. I could have pushed her away. Could have covered my eyes and fallen to my knees on the cold stone floor, begging for forgiveness, rending my clothing in the manner of remorseful men. But I let that moment pass. And when she kissed me, her soft mouth pressing against my own, I knew that my fate was set. The twin threads of our destiny tied together in an intricate knot that no man or wrathful god might untangle, where the Fates wove one thread now forced to also weave the other, bound to her forever.

All my life I had been looking for my fate, and here, at last, I had found it with her. 

She broke the kiss, drawing away, and at once I wanted her back in my arms, wanted to reach up and pull her back down to me, clasp her body tightly against my own. I controlled the urge, letting out a ragged breath. Not for the world would I ever harm her, nor risk marking a single inch of her flawless skin with bruises, no matter how quickly she might heal. 

“You can touch me,” she said, in that low voice that I already knew I would remember to the end of my days. Even if I never saw her again - if this time was all we would ever spend together, if Poseidon himself burst in now and ripped her from my clinging arms - I knew that I would still hear her voice, whispering to me through the endless waves, following me through all the days of my empty life, carried in on the cooling breeze that blew across my deathbed. 

I touched her, and was overwhelmed. The skin of her blushing cheek, as delicate as new blossom, her hair flowing over my hands like heavy silk, her eyelashes fluttering against my fingers like the gossamer caress of a butterfly’s wing. The straight line of her collarbone would have put the finest architects to shame; the hollow of her throat was a golden cup from which a king might drink the most expensive wine. Her breasts, when I removed her chiton, were high and full, with soft pink nipples that quickly hardened at my touch, begging for the attention of my mouth - which I gladly gave. Her stomach was a lush meadow, the curve of her hips like the movement of gentle waves lapping against a peaceful shore. Her hands were surely too fine to have ever held a shuttle or plucked at a lyre; the skin of her feet too delicate to have ever walked a day in her life, carried straight from her mother’s arms to mine. 

Let other, greater men measure their worth in conquered lands, their ears ringing with the wailing of their enemy’s women, their boats riding low in the water with the guilty weight of their plundered wealth, paid for in blood and bitter tears. What need did I have to journey to distant shores, when I already held the finest riches that this world had to offer, here in my own two hands? What victory could I win that would rival the helpless tossing of her head against the pillow, what greater prize existed than her hand reaching out blindly for mine across the bed, what songs of glory could ever hope to match the gasps and moans that fell from her parted lips? All the wonders of her father’s vast kingdom put together could not have equalled the treasures that lay between her soft thighs, and no hero ever gave greater or more fervant worship to his goddess than I did at the altar of my love’s hips, with myself as the willing sacrifice. 

When at last I kissed her again, my mouth was slick with her own salt taste, and both our faces were wet with tears.

Should I say that she was nervous, as she pushed me onto my back on the soft bed, as she clumsily rose up onto her knees over me? Should I tell you how she trembled, my shy virgin beloved, my strong hands steady on her hips as I gently guided her into position, showed her how to lower herself upon me? Or should I tell you the truth, making a confession of my weakness alongside everything else - that it was my own hands that were shaking like a newborn colt, my heart pounding in my chest, my mouth dry as I gazed up at her from the pillow? Her face was serene as she settled her slight weight above me, the ends of her silken hair brushing over the muscle of my thighs, and I, who have had more lovers than I can or care to remember, clutched at her as a drowning man holds onto his salvation. As she moved her hair caught the heavenly light of the ocean that shone into the room, glowing as if lit up from within, and I understood why gods must veil themselves when they appear before mortals, lest their divine radiance reduce men to ash. 

I would gladly have burnt up there and then, and counted myself a blessed man for it. 

Fearlessly she lowered herself - too fast, my hands tightening on her hips too late to slow her rapid descent - and helplessly I watched the pain washing over her face as I broke through her maidenhead, the salt-rust scent of her immortal blood filling the air. Her eyes, when she raised them to meet mine, were a wine-dark sea, even pain itself a kind of pleasure for one so unused to it. I groaned as she rolled her hips, testing the feel of me inside her, and it was a cry of defeat, knowing myself forever ruined for any other lover, our bodies fitting together like we had been designed for just such a purpose. 

Despite being a virgin, she neither sought nor needed any guidance from me, and I lay back, content to let her explore, to take her pleasure from me as she wished. She moved like the summer ocean, calm and unhurried, languid waves that belied stronger currents below, a riptide that threatened to drag us both down into unknown depths. She moaned, arching her back as I hit some place deep with her, and, unable to resist, I ran my hands up over her waist to cup her breasts, feeling the soft weight of them as she moved. I circled her nipples with my thumbs, again and again until she gasped, leaning down over me so that I could suck at them, her fingers tightening in my hair as she held me fast against her. 

She cried out when she came, dragging my mouth back up to hers so that she could kiss me, biting and nipping at my lips in her frenzy. Feeling her hips start to slow, I at last let my hands guide her movements, forcing her to keep rocking against me until she moaned into the kiss, her pleasure reaching a new peak, drawn out almost past bearing. My own self-control fraying beyond repair, I finally thrust up into her, groaning as she pulsed around me, wrapped my arms tightly around her, cradling her limp body against my own as I joined her in ecstasy. 

Afterwards, as she lay exhausted on my chest, I rolled us both gently to our sides, my arm beneath her head to serve as her pillow. Her eyes were closed, her body damp with sweat as she struggled to regain her breath, and I lowered my head to press my mouth against her throat, feeling her immortal heart beat against my lips. 

\- - 

Her name, I learned in the quiet minutes that followed, was Clarke. A strange name, foreign to these shores, given to her by her mother in the last moments before Poseidon came to claim his offspring, the only trace of her mortal life that he would permit to remain.

She knew very little of her mother. What scant information she did have, she had gleaned from the stories of her sisters and aunts, hushed whispers of a famed wise woman, a miraculous healer with fingers permanently stained green from the juices of crushed herbs, the hem of her cloak dark from gathering morning dew. Proud and cunning, and sworn to be beholden to no man, the kind of declaration that lands like a thrown gauntlet at the feet of arrogant men, enough to pique the interest of even such a god as Poseidon. It made sense, Clarke said, lying quiescent in my arms as I ran my hand over her shining hair, traced the curve of her perfect ear with my thumb. Alone among her myriad sisters she had been born with an endless thirst for knowledge, curious about the inner workings of plants and animals, fascinated by the mortal world and how it differed from the divine. I could tell that it was a source of comfort for her, to think that she might share those traits with her mother. 

Clarke laughed over my own name, sounding it out in a husky tone that sent the blood rushing to my loins once more, her round pink mouth obscene and irresistable. 

“ _Bellamy_ ,” she said, eyes lighting up with mischief, putting the emphasis on the first syllable and drawing out the last, my own name made a stranger to my ears. She rolled onto her back, stretching languorously, lifting her arms above her head so that her breasts stood high on her chest. “Like the Gauls, to the west?”

I shrugged, in truth more concerned with the movement of her breasts than the origin of my name. My own lineage held little interest for me, my past a well-worn and weary burden on my shoulders that I had no desire to take up again, having finally found relief in her arms. I reached up to cup one warm breast in my hand, Clarke sighing as I stroked along the generous curve. Already I wanted her again. “I’m not sure. My father named me, and he died before I got the chance to ask him.”

\- -

The days that followed were both the sweetest and the most painful of my life, pleasure so sharp and keen that it pierced my heart like a silver knife, a constant ache in my side like a slow healing wound. While my sister spent her days negotiating with Poseidon - and her nights working her way through his serving girls - and the other men amused themselves with endless games and fights, I was free to devote myself to the fulfilment of just one desire. Clarke.

There are those that say Poseidon is a liar, a fool adorned in gilt and stolen finery, a usurper king with a false crown. That, for all his bluster and pride, all the furious might of churning waters and crashing waves at his command, the seas are in fact nothing more than handmaidens to the moon, the ebb and flow of tides held in thrall to that distant silvery orb. But they must be wrong. For if there is no power in the waves - if all is just empty noise and meaningless destruction, those vast depths devoid of any mystery or significance - how can can I explain the hold that she had over me, my very own sea goddess?

Despite how Octavia liked to tease me, I was not yet an old man, some withered old maid immune to the charms of either men or women. If I was no longer the same proud fool I’d been in my youth, delighting in both my own beauty and the fawning reactions of others to it, taking a lover was perhaps the closest I could get to the reckless boy I’d once been, often the only joy remaining to my world-weary self. Many companions I’d taken from among the men on the ship, relationships of convenience or affection, and sometimes even both. Women too, on our brief soujourns ashore, sweet girls that tasted of wine and honey, pliant and yielding like gently swaying fields of golden wheat. Over the years I had grown to appreciate the lure of both virgins and experienced lovers, had happily learned to play both the dominant and the submissive partner in turn, enthusiastically availing myself of every carnal delight I encountered during our long voyage.

Clarke outshone them all. I was a boy with her, a man of thirty-five tumbled back into trembling youth by a maiden that looked half my age. She contained multitudes - all the grace and beauty of girlhood, married with the knowledge of centuries, the experience and wisdom of a thousand generations of mortal men - and yet she carried it lightly, in a way that put me silently to shame, I who carried my miserable handful of years like the eternal burden of Atlas on my exhausted shoulders. 

Unluckily for me, lovesick fool that I was, I was not the only one clamouring for Clarke’s time and attention. Her sisters were too many to count, outnumbering the grains of sand on the beach - and, as I thought in my less charitable moments, just as irritating. I was but one of Clarke’s many worshippers, the very least of all her devoted followers, the same quality that had drawn me to her also raising her to the status of leader among her sisters. Maybe it was the blood of her witch mother that made them look to her as the wisest among them, valuing her opinion above any other, seeking her judgement on every dispute, no matter how minor. It was she who they called upon to oversee their singing competitions and award the laurel wreaths; she who taught them how to artfully arrange their long hair into intricate braids and loops; she who listened sweetly to their lute playing and then patiently adjusted the placement of their fingers. They squabbled for the chance to lay their heads in her lap, although the honour usually went to her favourite Geren, the smallest and shyest of all her sisters, all the more beloved for having been born with a female soul into a male body. 

And it was not just her sisters that interrupted our time together. Clarke’s aunts, also, could barely bring themselves to let her out of their sight, constantly pleading with her to come and sit by their feet as they wove, to listen to their stories as they plied her with figs and other sweet fruits, to let them comb out her long hair and admire how it shone golden in the light. Even ancient Despoina, silent and unknowable beneath her heavy veil, had chosen Clarke as her favourite of Poseidon’s daughters, often summoning her to serve in her rooms, far below in the deepest and darkest parts of the palace. I never knew what took place there, what tasks Clarke was asked to perform or what arcane secrets she learned at the mysterious goddess’ knee, but when she returned from those long days she would be tired and drawn, her hands shaking in mine, her eyes pale and cold as chipped ice. 

Clarke, alone in the universe, trusted above all others, had even seen what lay beneath Despoina’s veil. Once, as we lay together in sated repose, I dared to ask my beloved what she had seen underneath the thick fabric - but one fierce glance from her was enough to cut me off, my voice fading away into chagrined silence. I did not ask again. 

Though it was Poseidon who sat upon the great stone throne in the hall, in his name that the sacred bulls were slaughtered and the toasts held high, it soon became obvious to me that the real power in that place lay elsewhere. Resented by him, the great god bitter than he had never managed to sire a son, yet forbidden from leaving the palace, Poseidon’s women had made their own court, like an olive tree growing around impenetrable rock, stubbornly reaching for the light. I was not the only one made invisible by my unimportance. Right under Poseidon’s nose, the deity paying as little attention to them as he did to the mice scurrying around his feet, Clarke and her sisters had quietly created another world, rich with laughter and affection and all the warmth that those damp stone halls otherwise lacked. There was fear there, for certian. Poseidon’s rage was legendary, and only a fool would not tremble to bring his wrath down upon them. Yet often I detected a hint of indulgence there also - a certain twist of the lips when Clarke spoke of him, a scornful glint in her eye - so that one could almost imagine Poseidon to be a sulking child, rather than one of the greatest Olympians. 

In truth, there were times when I almost felt sorry for the peevish deity, prevented by his own spite from seeing the beauty of the riches that surrounded him. Clarke was everything that Poseidon might have hoped for in a son, if only he had cared to see it - most beloved, first among many, a natural leader blessed with both courage and the mercy to temper it - and yet he ignored her. If he had been even a little cleverer, he would have taken her to his side, named her trusted second and heir, but alas! Cleverness is not always among the divine gifts apportioned to the gods. Not cleverness, and not love. If it were only so, we might find ourselves living in an altogether different, and kinder, world. 

Thus was Clarke’s time for me limited, despite how desperately we yearned for one another, how jealously we coveted the days remaining to us, cursing the fragile dawn light that broke across the horizon each morning. My days without her were grey and unworthy of note, stumbling bleary-eyed to my duties, my sister grimacing at my clumsy footwork, the constant clatter of my spear to the hard ground. I was not a bad soldier, and normally I found some peace in the repetition of endless drills, the mindless exhaustion that came with a day’s hard training, but suddenly I had lost whatever skill I once had, my mind far away in that silken bed. My poems, too, lost their lustre, the words falling away to dust and ashes on my tongue, empty notes that rang as hollow as as rich man’s prayer. What was the point of anything that was not Clarke? I could have written entire epics about the curve of her throat, the shadowed valley between her breasts, the heavenly symmetry of her brow. Her hips alone pointed towards the existence of a higher power, geometric proof of the divine logic of the universe. But for Octavia’s heroics, I felt nothing. I had seen the true wonder of the world, my newly opened eyes anointed with the scented oil of desire, and my sister’s bravery in battle paled in comparison. 

Somehow, the lack of her only made the having, and the anticipation of having, sweeter. Separated from Clarke all through the endless daylight hours, the evenings became an exercise in restrained desire, like a note held so high and so long that the string begins to quiver in exquisite ecstasy. Each night I held my breath as we gathered in the great hall, the constriction in my chest only tightening as Poseidon’s daughters joined us, the distant patter of theit footsteps on the stone floors heralding their arrival like the fall of rain after a long season’s drought. I had made it my habit to sit in the back of the hall, hiding myself safely - or so I thought - from notice, and from my place in the shadows I would watch as Clarke walked in, the rest of the world falling away. My cup remained full, my plate untouched - but no matter. The real feast had not yet begun. 

How many hours did I spend exploring her body? Setting my mouth to every inch of her gentle curves, memorising the soft plush weight of her in my hands, inhaling the divine scent of her skin like the breath of all creation? I feasted on her each night, swallowing down her laughter and her cries with an equal ravenous hunger, soothing my parched throat with all the fine vintages of her body, from the salt bitterness of her tears to the sweet ambrosia between her thighs. And I do not think I lie when I say that Clarke felt the same hunger, reaching for me with equal need, rousing me to further desire even when I swore that I could not move an inch - my limbs trembling with exhaustion, my vision blurred with sweat. Like poor Erysichthon, cursed to suffer with eternal hunger, our need was never sated, both of us enslaved to the same boundless appetite.

Do not be fooled, however, into thinking that it was only lust that lay between us. There was peace too, the two of lying entwined as the sweat on our bodies slowly cooled, finding just as much joy in the joining of our minds as the union of our bodies. Alongside her other gifts, Clarke was a gifted storyteller, weaving tales with a deft hand that both delighted and appalled, the history of the gods turning out to be just as petty and undignified as any other family. She’d had hundreds of years to study the world, and used each one of them well, memorising the inner workings of every plant and creature, mapping the movements of planets like old friends, learning the secrets of every fish in her father’s ocean. And I exchanged all her precious jewels for dusty pebbles, describing for her in return the lands of my childhood home, my voyages with Octavia, the secrets of raising goats. I might have been ashamed of my contributions, but she listened to every word with a rapt ear, as fascinated by the story of how I had once saved a goat from a rushing river as I had been by her tale of Hera’s feud with Hercules. 

There was only one thing that we did not talk about: in all the hundreds of hours we spent in eager conversation, her father’s name was never uttered in our bed. I cannot say why. Perhaps, for all our recklessness, part of us still feared that saying Poseidon’s name aloud would instantly draw his divine gaze to us, bringing his wrath down upon the idyll that we had only just begun to build together. More than once I watched as Clarke began to say his name, only to demur at the last moment, a slight wrinkle to her brow as she swiftly steered the story in a different direction, her hand tightening briefly around mine. Such near misses brought a cold chill into the room, a shiver running down my spine at the intrusion of the outside world into our bed - an unwelcome guest that, once let in, was not so easily shut out again. 

So, you see, I lie. There is one other thing that we did not talk about - when I would leave. 

\- -

One night I went to Clarke’s rooms to find her face lit up with excitement, those blue eyes sparkling, rushing and reckless like a mountain stream after the first spring melt. Her hair was loose and wild about her shoulders, her thin white chiton fine as sea mist, so delicately woven that I could see the pink of her nipples through the gauzy fabric, the shadow of the golden hair between her legs. The blood surged in my veins as I reached for her, desire rapidly turning to disappointment as she nimbly stepped back, just out of my reach. 

Putting her finger to her lips, smiling at my look of confusion, she took my hand in hers and led me out of her chamber, across the hallway and down a passage I had never noticed before, so cramped and narrow that two men could not walk abreast. It was steep, the floor uneven beneath my feet, leading further down into the depths of the earth than I had ever ventured before.

I followed blindly, forced to drop Clarke’s hand to feel my way along the winding passage, so dark that I could barely make out her form even two feet in front of me, fleeting glimpses of her flowing chiton like the white smoke of a signal fire in the darkness. The way was difficult, and became even more so, the walls dripping with slick condensation that made it hard for me to maintain my grip, the air slowly taking on the acrid stench of sulfur, sticking in my throat. More than once, I wondered uneasily where she could be taking me, whether my beloved was leading me down into the underworld, there to be abandoned to wander forever among those hopeless shades that inhabit Hades’ domain. There were rivers in the underworld, were there not? And thus, it followed, the water nymphs to guard them?

Something brushed against my ankle in the darkness, snapping me out of my morbid thoughts, and I stumbled, my hands scrabbling over the damp rock as I fought to keep my balance. I looked down to see a small green snake dart past my feet, wicked tail lashing at my skin as it passed.

“Quiet,” Clarke hissed, turning. She reached back for my hand, squeezing it firmly between her own to let me now that she was not truly angry with me. I could not see her face in the shadows, but could imagine all too well the teasing smile on her face, by then a familiar sight in our bed. It had become a joke between us, my mortal clumsiness, my heavy tread so unlike her own. Clarke liked to say that I came to her as a rolling storm, my stumbling steps as loud as booming thunder as I made my way across the palace, my hand on her door like the sudden crack of lightning. 

Eventually the tunnel levelled out, slowly widening so that we could walk side by side once more, Clarke’s fingers tightly entwined with mine as I drew her against my side. Just as I turned to her, meaning to ask our destination, the passage suddenly opened out into a great cavern, so brightly lit that I was forced to cover my eyes, by then accustomed to darkness.

When at last I lowered my hand, blinking through watery eyes, I found myself once more looking around in awe.

The chamber we stood in was massive, larger even than Poseidon’s great hall - but unlike the rooms of his palace, artlessly hacked from solid rock, this vast space was clearly naturally formed. High above us, the ceiling dripped with jagged stalactites, huge stone formations reaching upwards from the floor to meet them, like some great unseen hand had reached in and crumpled the rock like papyrus. Light blazed from dozens of torches set in hidden recesses, illuminating a series of shimmering turquoise pools, their heated water bubbling gently, steam rising from the surface to warm the room. The humid air was scented with fragrant lavender and sage, and somewhere to my right a waterfall gracefully tumbled over rock, filling the cavern with the soothing sound of its gentle cascade.

“These are the sacred pools. The first waters,” Clarke said from behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. I reached for her, pulling her in again my chest, and she came willingly, standing up on tiptoes to murmur into my ear. I tucked my face into her neck as she spoke, breathing in the warm scent of her skin. “Look around you, mortal, and behold the place where life first formed. No man may enter here. Even my father is forbidden to cross the threshold.”

I swallowed heavily, my stomach twisting. I had not dwelled in Poseidon’s halls these past few weeks without learning of all the cunning torments he had devised for those that angered him - a petty god, blessed with infinite time and infinite wrath to spend upon the wretched bodies of mortals. I had already seduced his daughter, an unthinkable crime for a guest bound by all the ancient customs of hospitality. To break another of his rules was sheer folly. 

Gently I pushed Clarke back from me so that I could see her face, her jaw set in an expression of defiance. The light from the flickering torches set her stormy eyes aflame, like burning pitch poured on furious waters.

“Beloved, I cannot trespass upon another of your father’s rules.”

She smiled, reaching up to smooth the anxious lines from my brow. “These are not my father’s rules. These are _our_ rules, and ours to break besides.”

“Your father…” I looked around, gesturing at the wonder that surrounded us. “Your father created all this, but allows you to deny him entrance?”

Clarke scoffed, her face contemptuous. The fire in her eyes blazed. “My _father_ built his halls over these pools and claimed them as his own handiwork, and now there is almost no one left to know the truth of it. There is magic far older and greater than that of my father, even if he does not care to see it.”

She let her chiton then, and reached for mine, and there was no more conversation to be had. The torchlight turned her skin to shining pearl, to polished alabaster, and I was no better than hapless Pygmalion, entranced by the beauty of the living statue that stood before me. 

Giggling, Clarke pulled me towards the largest of the pools, her light feet dancing nimbly over the sharp stones and jagged rocks that hampered my path. The waters themselves were clear as glass and startlingly warm, seemingly heated by the fires of Hephaestus himself - his eternal forge surely close at hand, so deep were we in the bowels of the earth. I closed my eyes as I sat on one of the natural ledges at the edge of the pool, leaning back against the rock, letting the heat seep into my tired bones. In the silence, I fancied that I could almost hear it, the roaring flames of the god’s great furnace, the clarion ring of hammer against anvil reverberating through the rock beneath me. 

Warm water suddenly splashed into my face, rousing me from my daydream. Opening my eyes, I saw Clarke treading water before me, her golden hair fanning out across the surface of the pool like dappled sunlight. 

“Play with me?”

If on land Clarke was graceful, in water she was truly divine. She swam like a silver fish, darting this way and that through the clear crystal waters, and took great joy in teasing me, entreating me to chase her across the pool. I have spent half my life on the sea, and count myself an able swimmer, but I have never felt as slow and clumsy as I did then, lurching through the bubbling waters, reaching out with the very tips of my fingers to feel the wet silk of her hair or the slender bone of an ankle, only to have it slip through my hands, my fist closing around nothing. I began to wonder if, in all my avid explorations of her body, I had somehow missed patches of scales covering her pale skin, a set of finely webbed toes, even a pair of gills tucked discretely behind her delicate ears. Once, my vision obscured by a jet of water, she leaned in to kiss me, her soft mouth pressing against mine underwater, but by the time I recovered my wits enough to raise my arms she was already gone. Her delighted laughter echoed off the cavern walls around us, loud as she only dared to be down here. 

At length she tired of her game, making her way over to the ledge and beckoning me in to lie against her, to rest my weary head upon her chest. She hummed some easy tune, her fingers combing gently through my tangled hair, and I was becalmed, my breath gradually slowing to match the steady thud of her heartbeat.

And yet, as we lay there in that sacred and beautiful place, the proof of my beloved’s divinity all around us, I found myself swallowing down my growing resentment for what it signified, the knowledge of her immortality like a stone set between us. 

\- -

The moon completed her cycle once, twice. Fool that I was, I began to hope that our time together might continue indefinitely, that perhaps we would be spared the wrenching pain of parting. The gods do not measure time in the same way that we mortals do, untouched by either the misery of old age or fear of death, and perhaps a little of that indifference began to grow within me too, after spending so long in that strange place. 

Ah, but I give myself more credit than I deserve. For what could be more desperately human, more pathetically mortal, than to ignore the truth of what lies plain before you?

However it came to be, it was still a shock when Octavia finally sought me out after the daily drills and told me to prepare to leave. 

“When?” I managed, turning away to hide my stricken expression, pretending to test the point of a spear with the tip of my finger. Sharp bronze pierced my skin, bright red blood instantly welling up to the surface, but I barely felt the pain, nothing compared to the razor-edged panic tearing at my chest. 

“Three days.” My sister’s voice was distracted, as it always was with me. Such is my lot it seems - to love women with their sights fixed on distant shores and new horizons, a far greater future than I could ever hope to provide. Already Octavia was turning away, looking towards her next task. “At dawn.”

\- -

My heart was heavy as I made my way to Clarke’s rooms that night, hanging in my chest like a leaden weight, slowing the movement of my limbs as though I waded through deep water. Outside a great storm raged, and all around me echoed the booming sounds of waves crashing against rock, so close and so loud that it seemed as if the walls might collapse at any moment. Truth be told, I would have welcomed it - to see that cursed place reduced to rubble and ashes, to bargain away the pain to come for an altogether swifter, kinder death. As I descended through the tunnels, I felt the crushing pressure of the earth on my shoulders as I had not felt it for a long time, a growing oppression that only deepened my sense of helplessness, the inescapable knowledge of my own insignificance. 

Clarke was not waiting for me in bed as she usually did. Instead I walked in to find her standing with her back to the door, staring out into the darkening depths of the roiling sea, a deadly maelstrom of swirling currents that whipped and lashed against the magical barrier as if they desired nothing more than to rush in and destroy us all. She gave no sign that she had heard me enter. 

Swallowing down my fear, I walked over to join her. When she turned to me, her eyes were deep blue, so dark that they were almost black, the colour of those dread waters at the very bottom of the sea where all hope is lost, the last sight of drowning men. 

“So, you are leaving.” In that moment I could not tell her voice apart from the sound of the storm, the raging tumult that surrounded us. 

I nodded, my mouth dry. 

“I always knew,” Clarke said, voice bitter. She turned away, back to the sea, and we stood together in miserable silence, watching the frantic shoals of silver fish as they desperately sought shelter from the oncoming destruction. Thunder rolled overhead, low and ominous, and I shuddered as only a sailor would, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling. “I always knew that you would leave. That there was no hope for us.”

I opened my mouth, and closed it again. What could I say? What words of cheer or comfort could I hope to offer her, this divine creature who had already learned and forgotten more than I would ever know, who would live to watch the world crumble to dust and the stars snuffed out like candles, my entire existence lasting no longer than the blink of her immortal eye? Once again I wished myself a greater man, that I might have come to her fearless and defiant, a mighty hero who would storm the gates of Olympus and bring down the very gods themselves, my sword hand strengthened with glorious purpose. But alas, I came to my beloved that night as I had always come to her, from the very beginning - as a shipwrecked survivor collapsing onto a sacred shore, stripped of all pride and honour, offering up all the pieces of my shattered soul in the hopes that she might put them back together. 

“I always knew,” she continued. Her voice broke, and above us the wind rose, a furious whirlwind as if the gods were trying to sweep mankind from the surface of the earth. “I always knew, that I could not let myself fall in love with you.”

Unable to bear another word, I reached for her, clasping her body tighly against mine. She gasped, collapsing into my arms, and as I lowered my mouth to hers there was a terrible cracking sound, a lightning bolt tearing through the ocean in a deadly blanket of light, the room suddenly illuminated by a ghostly white glow. I groaned into the kiss, a low cry of pain as though the bolt had struck me instead of the waters, my heart split cleanly in two. 

I bore her down onto the bed, our hands tearing at each other’s clothing, and took her. There could be no other word for it, as she writhed and sobbed beneath me, my back ripping open under her nails, my throat bruising under her sharp white teeth. For the first time I held her as tightly as I dared, the soft form of my love seemingly replaced with that of some great thrashing sea serpent, a Hydra with flashing sapphire eyes and infinite clutching limbs, dragging us both down to certain destruction. I cursed my gentleness, wishing that I had the stomach to hold her even tighter, to leave a mark on her immortal flesh that would endure even past my death, a memory to live on through all the endless ages of the earth, long after my bones had been bleached white by a merciless sun. 

The storm continued all night, but it was nothing compared to the violence of our bed, the war that we waged between those white sheets, desperately fighting for a relief that refused to come. It was not against each other that we fought, although you might be forgiven for thinking so - two lovers at the end of all things, suddenly finding that there was no time left for gentleness, feeling ourselves cut down to the bone, every touch landing as if upon an exposed nerve. No. The battle we fought was far more foolish, and doomed to defeat from the very start. We may as well have wrestled with the waves or commanded the encroaching tides to retreat; gone out onto the clifftop and screamed the full might of our fury into the indifferent wind.

For the battle we fought was against our very natures, and there could be no victory.

\- -

When I woke the next morning, after a few hours of fitful sleep, Clarke was gone.

The sea hung limp and lifeness, dull waters clouded with debris thrown up from the ocean floor. I was sore and exhausted, my head pounding like I had spent the whole night drinking, and I moved slowly as I gathered my clothes, sneaking out of the room just as dawn began to streak across the horizon. I was careful to keep to the shadows on my way back to the great hall, avoiding the bustling corridors around the kitchens, pausing at every corner to listen for other early risers. To be caught now would be bitter irony indeed.

After a quiet breakfast, my sister took command of the beach, overseeing the men as they prepared the fleet for travel. To look at her, you would not have thought that this was the same woman who had spent the last two months taking advantage of Poseidon’s hospitality, rarely seen without a girl in one hand and a cup in the other. All traces of indulgence were gone: her slender body clad in bulky leather armour, long dark hair pulled back into tight braids that would afford no advantage to an opponent, eyes outlined in the thick black kohl that had become her signature war paint. She paced up and down the stony shore, shouting instructions; but every so often she would pause, cocking her head to the side as she looked off into the middle distance, and in those moments I knew Athena was whispering in her ear, giving her guidance. 

Keeping my head low, I took my place silently among the men as they checked over the ships, making good any damage from the night before. It was painstaking work, requiring a certain degree of concentration, and I welcomed the distraction that it provided, keeping my thoughts fixed on my tasks, content to blame the stinging salt air for my watering eyes.

“I have barely seen you these past weeks, big brother.”

Octavia’s shadow fell over the fishing net that I was repairing, the frayed cords having fallen victim to the teeth of rodents. The man next to me looked up and swiftly moved away, pretending to attend to some other task, and I cursed his cowardice. I was in no mood for a battle of wits with my sister.

“I have been at your side,” I replied lightly, keeping my head bent to my work. _As always_ , I did not add, although the words hung in the air between us nonetheless.

“Have you?” She shifted, stones crunching beneath her feet. “Or have you been with another?”

I stopped, letting the net fall to the ground before I slowly got to my feet. My sister’s face was solemn as she looked up at me, her sharp eyes boring into mine. Foolish of me, to think that I could have kept such a secret from Octavia. Even without a goddess whispering into her ear, she had always been a curious little thing, hoarding secrets as other children might hoard toys, following closely at my ankles in the hope of finding me in wrongdoing.

“I have to admit, I am impressed.” Octavia grinned, raising an eyebrow. “Even I would not have dared to seduce one of the daughters. Although perhaps I might try tonight, if you recommend it. Tell me brother, what is it like, lying with such a creature? Is she cold inside, like a fish?”

My cheeks burned, my hands clenching at my side, but I did not reply. At last my sister sighed, her face softening. 

“Forget her, Bellamy. She is not for you.” She reached out to place a hand on my arm, her expression earnest, and I caught a fleeting glimpse of the girl that I used to know, the sweet child that I used to carry on my shoulders through the fields, the little sister that used to creep into my bed for comfort on stormy nights. “Perhaps it is time for you to find your own path, big brother.”

\- - 

Clarke did not come to dinner that night, although I looked for her, craning my head above the tables to search the ranks of Poseidon’s daughters as they filed into the hall. For once my sister kept her peace, busying herself with the buxom redhead nestled into her side, but several times I felt her concerned eyes rest on my face. 

_Let her pity me_ , I thought bitterly. _For am I not a man most deserving of pity, and contempt besides?_ Whatever borrowed grace I had once possessed, whatever divine light had once shone on me from my beloved, was gone, leaving me a pale and trembling thing. 

Towards the end of the meal I felt the hairs on my arm rise, my chest tightening, and I looked up hopefully - but my love was nowhere to be seen. Instead I saw to my horror that ancient Despoina had lifted her head in my direction, and though her eyes were hidden behind her veil I still felt the heavy weight of her gaze as it settled upon me, holding me in place as neatly as a fish caught in a net. When, after a long moment, she finally turned away, my entire body slumped in relief, my head spinning as I gasped for breath, as if some great invisible fist had suddenly loosened its grip and set me back on the earth. 

I went to Clarke’s rooms that night, but she was not there. Only the unmade bed where we had lain, the sheets long since cold. 

\- - 

The remainder of my time there passed in a blur of mindless activity. I swear that no man has ever worked half as hard as I did in those two days, pushing myself to a place past exhaustion, hoping to drown out the screaming of my heart with the clang of hammer against nail, to numb my mind with the weaving of ropes and the steady planing of wood. I toiled on the ships until I could barely stand, until the palms of my hands bristled with splinters like a hedgehog, skin split open and stinging from the harsh salt water. I returned to the palace only to sleep, and only reluctantly, resenting every moment that I had to spend within those cold halls, the misery that seemed to coat every surface like a thin layer of oil, starkly obvious now that the veil of my joy had been lifted.

I did not go back to Clarke’s rooms again, not did I see her in the great hall. But I did see her. Every night I dreamt of her, and always the same dream - descending through those black tunnels far below the palace, chasing glimpses of her white chiton like a guttering light in the darkness, her teasing laughter echoing off the damp stone walls. Endlessly I pursued her, reaching to feel the hem of her silken gown brush against my fingertips - only to then stumble and fall to the hard earth, left behind in the still and silent dark. She never turned around, nor slowed her steps, no matter how loudly I called out to her, screaming her name until my voice gave out, like all broken men cry out to indifferent gods. 

It seemed an especially cruel trick, that I could not escape my sorrow even in sleep, my grief like a fine silken net that only tightened the more I struggled, tangling itself all the more closely about my limbs the more desperately I tried to tear myself free. 

The other men moved their bedding away from mine, sick of being woken by my hoarse shouts in the night, complaining that my incessent tossing and turning was worse than being at sea. I came to the breakfast table each morning with shadowed eyes and trembling hands, refusing the strong wine that my sister offered, choking down a few bites of bread before going back out to the beach, welcoming the biting sea air that hit me like a slap to the face. The winds were strong here, at the very end of the world, and as I opened my arms I offered up a silent prayer, that all my troubled thoughts might be carried away like dandelion seeds, borne away by the merciful Anemoi into blessed oblivion. 

Too soon, not soon enough, the third day came. It was a reluctant dawn, weak light limping across a grey horizon, illuminating a sea as flat and still as glass, no wind to lift the sails and speed us on our way. A dead man’s sky. The men muttered darkly, looking nervously amongst themselves, and Octavia scowled, turning away to wander along the shore and seek Athena’s guidance. I wondered briefly if this were one of Poseidon’s tricks - for the first time thinking to question whether we left these shores as honoured guests or defeated challengers, tail tucked firmly between our legs. I pondered the question for a scant second before I let it drop, indifferent. What did I care for our continued safe passage, for my own survival? Let the whole fleet founder upon the rocks, our bodies sinking to the ocean floor, inglorious and unmourned, there to be eaten by crabs and snakes. It seemed a fitting end, for such human folly. Who did we think we were, to tempt jealous fate in such a manner, to lift our gaze from the earth and set it upon heavenly glory, to fight against the shackles of mortality that the gods had placed around our ankles? 

For is not the final fate of all men, rich or poor, hero or coward, the same - the cold and indifferent grave?

When my sister returned, her face was sombre, her stubborn jaw set in stone. She commanded the men to their positions despite their protestations, ignoring how they reached for their talismans, muttering words of protection as they rubbed the leather pouches between fingers and thumb. I went to my place in the first rank of oarsman, next to a youth that I did not know, having newly joined our group not six months before. He was beautiful, with skin even darker than my own and black hair set in tightly coiled rows, warm almond eyes fringed with long lashes like those of a camel. He smiled at me nervously, but I did not return it. 

A shout from my sister, the drummers setting a steady rhythm, and with a mighty groan we set the oars to the water. 

Thus it was that we began to creep our way out of Poseidon’s lands, silent and shameful, like a lover fleeing his mistress’s chamber. 

We had not made it even halfway out of the bay when a loud cry suddenly rent the air, savage and piercing. Around us a great wind rose, so loud that the yells of the men could barely be heard over the whirlwind, sound snatched instantly from the air as though plucked by some invisible hand. The ship rocked wildly from side to side, buffeted by violent waves that leapt over the rails and flooded the deck around our feet, men sent sprawling to the hard floor. The youth next to me fell into my shoulder before righting himself, looking around in panic. Only I did not move, or even look up, keeping my head stubbornly bent to my task, the soothing beat of the steady oar.

A second wild cry went up, just as loud as the first, and then one by one a chorus of a thousand ringing voices to join it, sounding a mournful lament such as I had only heard in the twilight hours after battle, when the women came to collect the bodies of their dead. Oh, that sound! How can I explain it to you, so that you might understand? Never had anything been so beautiful or so sad, their voices coming together to form one clear, pure note of sorrow that filled the air and resonated in my chest, chiming a kindred chord with my own desolate heart. I let out a cry, feeling the pain of separation as I had not dared let myself feel it before, a rising tide of grief that threatened to overwhelm me, a far greater danger than anything the violent sea had to offer.

Only then did I finally look up, my cheeks wet with tears, searching for my sister amongst the chaos. She stood steady at the prow of the ship, blood-red cloak flapping madly in the wind, one hand raised to shield her face as she surveyed the shore - and though her face was stern, her keen eyes narrowed, I swore that I saw something like a smile pass across her face. 

I rose, letting the oar clatter to the deck, and looked back to the place that we had just left behind.

To see a figure on the beach, white cloth billowing in the wind as they ran towards the sea, their weaving footsteps tracing a winding pattern in the sand. My vision was blurred with tears, and the shore was far behind us, steadily becoming more distant with every passing second - but I would have known that figure anywhere, the shape of the soft body that I had held against mine on so many nights, the blonde hair that had shone like burnished gold against the white sheets of our bed. 

“Go,” Octavia said, her voice as loud and clear in my ear as if she stood beside me. “Go, big brother.”

What possible reason was there to hesitate, what argument to delay? Nothing here was mine. This was not my life, and now, at last, I had my own story to tell.

One breathless moment - my heart pounding in my chest, the feel of the slippery wooden railing under my feet, the sound of that divine choir ringing in my ears - and then I leapt. 

The roiling waters rose to greet me, dragging me under the waves with eager hands, all my frantic struggles buying me nothing more than one desperate breath before I was sinking, reaching up helplessly towards the receding light. The voices were even louder under the surface, surrounding me in a dazzling, deafening chorus, and the storm-tossed waters frothed in their agitation, so that I found myself both deaf and blind, unable to even tell which way was up. I battled against the current, kicking my way towards the surface - but when I finally broke the water, gasping for air, I found to my surprise that I was almost to the shore, as if the waves had carried me back to her. 

I had barely set foot upon land before Clarke reached me, crashing into my outstretched arms. Slender though she was - and welcome though her weight was in my arms - the momentum was almost enough to carry me off my feet, nearly toppling us both into the crashing waves. Closing my eyes, gathering her tightly against me, I tucked my face into the curve of her neck, wetting her skin with salt water and tears alike. 

When she finally pulled back, her face was streaked with tear tracks, her hair mussed and in greater disarray than I had ever seen it before, even at the very height of our shared passion. And those were not the only changes wrought in my beloved. For the first time, standing there together on that stony beach, I could see the tiny pores in her flawless skin, the frizz of her golden curls where the salt air had curled it, spots of bright colour high in her cheeks from the exertion of her escape. No longer did she glow from within, as though lit by some internal, eternal flame. Instead, she closed her eyes as the clouds finally parted overhead, lifting her face to bask in the yellow warmth of the early morning sun. 

“You’re mortal,” I said, shocked, my hands tightening around her shoulders. “How?”

“Despoina,” she replied, her voice no less beautiful for its new human cadence.

_There is magic far older and greater than that of my father, even if he does not care to see it._

I searched her face, not yet daring to believe. “Despoina?”

“I begged her.” Clarke reached up to cup my cheek, stilling my frantic motions, bringing my forehead down to rest against hers. “She is not so old that she does not remember love.”

Around us the voices rose, reaching a shivering crescendo. Clarkes sisters and aunts, lamenting the loss of the finest among them, beautiful even in the depths of their boundless grief. This would not be the last song that they would sing in honour of their fallen sister, immortals learning for the first time the exquisite pain that came with loving something that could die. Perhaps it might even still their wrathful hands, the next time a mortal wronged them, having tasted the bitter tears of mourning. Or perhaps not.

I looked into my beloved’s eyes. No longer constantly shifting pools - now fixed forever, in the most beautiful shade of blue I had ever seen, bright and brilliant with possibility, the colour of those azure skies of my childhood, where I had once stood on white cliffs and looked out onto an unknown future. 

The blue of my home. 

\- -

I know. This is not the ending that you expected. 

Where is tragic Bellamy the noble hero, whose memory of his lost love spurs him through all his remaining days, leading him at last to reach the very heights of Olympus itself? Who will little boys pretend to be, as they brandish wooden swords and battle imaginary monsters, if not the mighty hero who cast off the last remaining parts of his humanity for eternal glory, trading all hope of happiness and love for the cold golden kiss of fortune? What will fill that gap in the starry night sky, if not the doomed goddess Clarke, trapped forever in some lonely constellation above mortals’ heads, just as she still dwells within the damp walls of Poseidon’s palace, having gambled and lost on love?

Who would ever listen to a story that ended with something so ordinary as happiness?

This is a story about fate, after all.

So let me tell you mine. 

We are both older now. To be expected, perhaps, but I believe that no man has ever found such pleasure in the slowly changing face of his beloved, the gold of her hair transmuted to finest silver, lines gathering at the corner of her eyes that speak to decades spent in joyful laughter, and love. I have grown a beard, which I will admit Clarke did not like - at first. After dedicating a great deal of time to showing her its many benefits, including the strange tickling sensations that it may provoke in the most delicate of places, she has grown to accept it. I daresay, she may even be quite fond of it, if the blush that adorns her cheeks whenever I mention it counts for anything.

Our eldest son is a man full-grown, although I cannot bring myself to quite believe it. A fine youth, with my dark hair and his mother’s stubborn nature, just as set on bending the world to his will as she did once, all those years ago. For a long time I watched him grow, my heart in my throat, just waiting to hear that fateful crack of lightning, the smell of petrichor filling our home - to lose my son to the whims of the gods, just as I had my baby sister. Eventually it was Octavia herself who calmed me, reminding me of something that I had chosen to forgotten - that even in matters of fate, we still have a choice. Athena may have come for my sister, but it was my sister who chose to leave, her adventurous heart ill-suited to a simple life spent tending goats. 

There is still time for me to lose him, to watch my sweet boy caught up in the eternal winds of destiny, tossed to and fro on indifferent winds. But, for now, he seems content to remain at our fireside, carving wooden toys for his younger siblings, making doe eyes at every maiden he meets. 

His, I think, is the only birth in history to have been attended by a full complement of naiads and nymphs, their white feet leaving the floor of our home dripping with salt water. The villagers still make a sign of protection when they speak of it, although over time they have become gradually accustomed to such strange things, living with their very own witch among them. Once we settled, it did not take long for Clarke to gain a reputation for herbcraft and healing, and now barely an hour goes by without some girl approaching our gate, seeking some potion to prevent pregnancy or attract the attention of a prospective lover. I know that there are whispers about me - that I am bewitched by Clarke, that I had no choice but to love her, once she set her divine sight on me. They are more right than they realise. 

But, you cry in frustration, what of _my_ fate? What do I do now, with all the long days of my life, free from fate and the intervention of the gods, with no grand adventures or trials to occupy my time?

Well, that is simple.

I live.


End file.
